Paradise Lost

It was hard for me. One night in Berlin, the next in Paris, and a week after we’d wind up in Japan. The traveling seemed so endless, perpetual movement that seemed to take everything except the minimum of what you needed to keep going. Looking out the window I can see the far reaching ocean, an infinite gray sea that no one should have to gaze upon so often as I without ever getting a chance to really see it.
I look over to the mop of blonde hair across the aisle. His eyes are closed and his brow is furrowed slightly. He must be asleep, I figure. Even as I think this I know it isn’t true, but still I get a spark of jealousy that he can seem so calm when feigning rest. How I wish I could muster that ability, the way he seems to escape in peaceful slumber, even the merest shadow of a true complacent sleep would be worth more than the plane we flew in.
Yes, not even restorative sleep could help me now, for I was too tired for restoration. Sleep for me now was as wearisome as the days following, the lines betwixt the two blurred together so flawlessly I can never hope to distinguish them. I find my hand slipping itself into my right pocket and I sigh as my finger grazes plastic. My other hand fumbles the pocket knife in the opposite side. I untie the opaque bag and look at the white powder within. I gaze momentarily at this release. Heh, my only saving grace. As fine as the sand lining a celestial beach, I dip the tip of the knife inside and raise it again. I stare at the mound on the shining blade even as my dull eyes stare back at me accusingly. I ignore them, because I know that this is all I have. I don’t have this plane. I don’t have the stadium we’re headed to. I don’t have me. All of those things have long since blurred into obscurity and I can never retrieve them. The only thing I have a grip on is this small bag clutched in my left hand, and I’ll be damned if it’s going to get away from me like everything else. No, this is my last line of distinction, the only thing that sharpens the edges enough for me to continue discerning them at all. Without it I would spiral far down into nothing, where all is gray like the endless ocean beneath me. I bow my head to the blade and inhale sharply through my nostrils.
Footsteps sound behind me and my shaking hand closes and replaces the thin blade as my other hand holds onto my prize with a vice like grip. The footsteps pass me and I do not raise my eyes. Tears prick the corners of those eyes but my hand does not let up. I gulp with self conviction. Don’t think I don’t know what I’m doing. I know the powder in my fist is nothing more than a lie and that it can’t possible offer any solace to my troubles. But asking me to let it go would be selfish and barbaric for I can see no other alternate in this gray sea before me. Knowing this is a path of self destruction, I choose to embrace it full on, as if it were a lover threatening flight from my arms.
My grip soon lessens and I draw my eyes to the window. Far off, I think I see shoreline to yet another foreign country. Or, maybe it’s home… Maybe it’s nothing but the trickery of my weary mind hoping for a break in the vastness; some symbol in the tired monotony that embodies every aspect of this excuse for living. And regardless of what lies before me, I fear that the outcome will be painfully the same, and that my only hope lies in a little opaque baggy, crushed tightly at my side.